Marlene van Niekerk - Triomf

Let her first go and see if it’s safe in the den. She can see neither Treppie nor Lambert. Just Pop, looking down at the floor. He’s puffing out clouds of smoke.

Now Treppie appears in the gap between the door and the frame. He’s taken a beer out of the Fuchs. Why does that beer can look like it’s got a bulge on one side? Treppie takes the beer to Lambert, going round the other side of the bed. ‘Down a Lion!’ is all she hears.

Right. If Lambert’s drinking beer, then he must be feeling better. She pushes open the door.

‘Watch out, Mol!’ It’s Pop. Now what? Why must she watch out all of a sudden? ‘Ka-pssshhhht!’ Treppie’s spraying Lambert full in the face with the beer, a long white jet, and she’s getting some of it too.

‘Oh, sis, God in heaven!’

Her front is full of foam and little white crumbs.

Lambert looks like he wants to murder Treppie, but he half falls over instead. That’s also why Treppie keeps standing there — he knows Lambert’s useless. Chuck that towel this side, he motions to her. Sis, now she smells of beer.

So sorry, Treppie says, passing Lambert the towel. Here, wipe off your face.

Ja, always so sorry, this Treppie. And what about her housecoat? Lambert sits up on the bed with his face in the towel. He doesn’t wipe off anything. He just sits there. But she can see his cheeks, they’re bulging, just like that beer can. Let her quickly put these Panados down where he can reach them, before he explodes like that beer. Once was enough, thank you.

Pop gets up. ‘Come,’ he says. ‘Let’s leave Lambert for a while so he can wake up in peace.’

‘Ag never! He’s as strong as a horse, man.’

Treppie makes rude movements to show how strong Lambert is.

‘And horses like him usually have wonderful horsey-stories to tell, especially when they’ve had a birthday as good as old Lambert here’s just had.’

Pop must look, and she must look, Treppie says, Lambert’s having a big birthday, it’s a birthday for Africa. They must sit, here’s a chair, and here’s another, and there’s even a crate for him, ’cause now they’re going to visit nicely here with Lambert in his den, on his birthday.

She doesn’t visit where there’s vomit, she wants to say, but she says nothing. She can see he’s the one who wants to tell all the stories, not Lambert, even though he’s on a crate and not a pulpit. And when Treppie wants to tell stories, then you’d better just sit and listen, otherwise you don’t hear the end of it, especially when it’s a bullshit-story. Just listen how he’s lying to Lambert now about how the girl they found for him wasn’t just first choice. About how she was such a livewire, you could just see it immediately there in the showcase at Cleopatra’s Creole Queens. That’s what makes Treppie’s bullshit-stories so terrible. They’re not outright lies, they’re semi-lies he builds on to. And it’s not like he first tells the truth and then adds on at the end. He lies all the way through the story, as far as he goes, and after a while you don’t know what’s what any more. Now he’s saying she was a livewire in a showcase, a dynamo and a back-kicker and a high-powered escort and a Voortrekker of a woman — with enough volts to set Lambert’s compass permanently due north.

And all Pop said about her was that she was a livewire on a street corner. Period.

So what was the truth about her, then?

Cinderella, says Treppie. A Cinderella who wanted to cross the Drakensberg mountains on bare feet, together with Prince Lambertus the Third. And does Lambert perhaps know where her other shoe is? Or maybe they can find this one’s heel and give it back to her tonight. Once she’s had a chance to catch her breath, that is.

See? How does Treppie know she’s out of breath? She can see that’s what Lambert’s thinking, too. He takes the towel away from his face to ask Treppie how, but Treppie’s looking up at the ceiling as if it’s the first time he’s ever seen it. He blows smoke rings and looks up through the rings.

‘Look, Pop, look, Mol, look, Toby, see how the stars shine in the firmament,’ Treppie says.

All she sees are blobs. Pale blobs. Some are pale green and others are pale red.

‘What do you see, Pop?’

‘I can’t see that far, Mol!’

‘Ja, old dog,’ says Treppie. ‘It’s a pity they sit so high, hey, all the Great Dippers, fish dip, avo dip, garlic dip!’

Toby licks his lips. He looks at Treppie and then at the blobs, up and down, up and down.

‘Also curious, hey, even if you’re just a dog,’ Treppie says. ‘You’d also like to know how the young master created that universe, hey? Maybe she said to him the sky’s the limit and started throwing the fish around. And then maybe he asked her whether she fancied a pie in that sky and threw up the garlic and avo on high!’

‘Hee-hee.’ Quite funny.

She can see Pop’s also got a smile on his face now.

Toby too. ‘Tiffa-tiffa-tiffa’ goes his tail against Treppie’s crate. His red tongue hangs from his open mouth.

‘Garlic yourself!’ is all Lambert says. He’s drinking down the Panados with rose-water. Sis, he just chucks that rose on to the floor and then he empties the whole bottle, ‘ghloob-ghloob-ghloob’.

‘Hell, but you’re thirsty, hey?’

Oh shit! Duck! Here it comes, but it’s not coming at her, it’s sailing towards Treppie, not straight but in a slow arc. Treppie’s got lots of time to duck. He ducks in slow motion and then watches the bottle as it falls. He whistles, ‘pheeeeeeww!’ like a slow-motion bomb. ‘Boof!’ it goes against against the wall. Treppie wipes off his shoulders with finicky little fingers, like he’s flicking off little flakes of dust.

‘This Mary, could she at least duck?’ he asks Lambert.

Pop points his finger at Treppie. He must go easy, now. No, Treppie signals back at Pop, it’s okay, he just wants to get Lambert going again, just like she, Mol, said he must.

Poor Lambert. He really looks like he’s had it. But she says nothing. If he has to suffer, then so be it. Just look at the house! And she’s the one who’ll have to do most of the cleaning up, as usual, even with three men in the house, or maybe one should say two, ’cause Pop can’t do anything any more. She’s got to cut the grass and she’s got to wash the car. And when Lambert goes wild, she has to pick up the pieces.

Like Treppie’s saying now, it looks like they were doing a bit of kickboxing here in the den, fridge-kicking and chair-kicking. He says it depends on your taste, but some people get turned on by the strangest things — Chippendales, crinkle cuts, fruit salad, fridges, frescoes, kick-boxing, you name it.

She pushes Pop. ‘Frisco, not fresco, Frisco. Tell him.’

‘No, Mol,’ Treppie says, ‘fresco, it’s not instant coffee, it’s paintings that they do on wet cement, on the walls of churches, about the so-called beginning and the so-called end.’

She catches Pop’s eye. Here we go again.

‘Pay attention, Mol, otherwise you won’t ever learn anything. You remember that story about the sixth day, when God felt a little lonely up there among his carp and his cactuses and things, and he made people so they could keep him company?’

No, she doesn’t remember God feeling like that. He’s God, after all. He always feels good.

‘Always is a very long time, Mol. And don’t forget, even God has a problem ’cause it’s the devil who finds work for the hands of the bored.’

‘The hands of the idle, Treppie, not boredom, idleness.’ It’s Pop. He must be so tired of correcting Treppie. He’s been doing it all his life.

‘Same thing,’ says Treppie. ‘Now watch nicely.’

What’s he doing now? He’s shaking and jerking Lambert’s mattress.